The artfulness of historical playwriting in Richard III: Shakespeare and English Tacitism

Art seems to be especially fruitful as a starting point for a re-reading of Shakespeare's Richard III as an example of an English history play that is more commonly understood in terms of nature or politics. Richard's reputation for being unnatural, that is physically and morally deformed, certainly makes nature a productive line of enquiry. Politics is also immediately relevant to a play about Richard III, whose demise marked the rise of the Tudor dynasty. However, I have chosen to consider the artfulness of Richard III to show how Tacitism informed Shakespeare's approach to historical playwriting.